【明報專訊】The average waiting time for public housing has reached a new high in over 20 years. The Housing Authority (HA) will hold a general meeting in the coming days. Various ideas have been put forward by different people. An HA member has suggested reducing opportunities for housing allocation to decrease the waiting time. Others have proposed fast-tracking the process by allocating applicants to uncompleted housing estates. To shorten the waiting time for public housing, the only way to treat the root cause is to speed up land creation for housing construction. Other methods will only be palliative and may easily breed new problems. If allocating public housing in advance is for the sake of "window dressing" and making the waiting time for public housing "more presentable", it will only be an act of deluding oneself and others. It is the government's duty to create land for housing development. Even if the target of accommodation within three years of application is unlikely to be met in the coming years, the authorities should at least state clearly the estimate for how many additional public housing units that have to be built to reach this target and formulate a work blueprint in this regard.